Articles in English related to this theme:

Conflict Resolution and Sustainable Peace Building

A War Hiding Another War ¤ Germà Pelayo ¤ 10 December 2015We are Syrians, Russians, Iraqis, Kurds, French, Malians, Tunisians, Palestinians, Nigerians, Yemenites, Libyans, Lebanese, Turks, Afghans, Mexicans, Kenyans, Somalians… we are Muslims, Christians, atheists, Hindus, Buddhists… we are workers, housewives, jobless, students, children, grandparents… we are persons. We are citizens of this world.
And we are at war. But we do not know who the enemy is. Because a very important battle in this war is the battle of narratives. And at the moment, the (...) read more

Persistent corruption in low-income countries requires global action ¤ Transparency International ¤ 26 September 2007The gap between the perceptions of the levels of corruption in rich countries and poor countries is always so clear: this is what emerges from the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2007 published by Transparency International. Developed countries and developing countries must share the responsibility in reducing corruption by cutting off both the supply and the demand for corruption.
The Corruption Perceptions Index 2007 analyses the perceptions of the level of corruption in the public (...) read more

Citizens’ Reappropriation of Politics

Binding Chaos ¤ Heather Marsh ¤ 10 November 2015The world is long overdue for a completely new system of governance. Every political system we have tried has proven incapable of protecting human rights and dignity. Every political system we have tried has devolved into oligarchy. To effect the change we require immediately, to give individuals control and responsibility, to bring regional systems under regional governance, allow global collaboration and protect the heritage of future generations, we need a new political model. (...) read more

For a Democratic Cosmopolitarian Movement ¤ Jean Rossiaud ¤ 14 March 2013The world ecological crisis and the inability of the international system of states to respond to it demonstrate that the human condition is now universal; more so than ever before. It is driving humanity (“the human race” or “humankind”) to think of itself today as a world community, to form itself into a world society and, like a world nation, to defend its survival and its future collectively.
Humanity is however struggling to see itself as a world community. Consciousness of sharing a (...) read more

Capitalism Has Failed: 5 Bold Ways to Build a New World ¤ Sara Robinson ¤ 31 December 2012The problem, in a nutshell, is this: The old economic model has utterly failed us. It has destroyed our communities, our democracy, our economic security, and the planet we live on. The old industrial-age systems—state communism, fascism, free-market capitalism—have all let us down hard, and growing numbers of us understand that going back there isn’t an option.
But we also know that transitioning to some kind of a new economy—and, probably, a new governing model to match—will be a (...) read more

Economic Governance and Globalization

The One Party Planet ¤ The Rules ¤ 9 November 2015So just who is in charge of this planet? Is it a small group of people with one plan? A large group of people with lots of competing plans? Several groups of people? Does it even make sense to think of ‘control’ in these terms at all?
This short pamphlet is an attempt to answer this question. The case I make is, yes, it not only makes sense to think of control in these terms, but it is essential. Those of us who believe in the potential for vastly less inequality and poverty, and a richer, (...) read more

Transfinancial Economics ¤ Robert Searle ¤ 28 July 2013Essentially, Transfinancial Economics model (TFE) claims that new largely monitored non-repayable money could be created electronically by special transparent, and credible funding mechanisms, or Facilitation Banks (and/or by governments to some extent). This could notably fund, in full or in part, environmental, and socio-economic projects of high ethical value. This would help to speed things up unlike loans.... though interest free ones could also be created electronically when (...) read more

Seven Leverage Points for the Passage from Economy to Œconomy ¤ Pierre Calame ¤ 13 May 2011The concept of leverage points is very well adapted for a coalition wanting to act in favor of the great transition. We need to identify some concrete issues which we think should have a strong leverage effect as it would imply changes in the whole system.
And looking at what is the systemic change about, it would not be a surprise that these leverage points relate either to concepts or to actors or to the very tools which are used in present economy. Here are seven proposed leverage (...) read more

Does Global Governance Ensure That the Global Public Interest Is Served? ¤ Joseph E. Stiglitz ¤ September 2006Globalization implies the emergence and development of global public goods. The major problem in the current international economic system of governance without government is that no effective means exist for assembling the necessary resources for financing these global public goods. The needs of international bodies such as the IMF, World Bank and WTO have never been stronger, but confidence in them has never been weaker.
Globalization is progressing, and it results in greater integration (...) read more

Call to Multiply the Village of Alternatives ¤ Alternatiba ¤ 25 February 2014As Stéphane Hessel said, one of the greatest challenges of our time was “climate change and environmental degradation due to the actions of man throughout the last three centuries. The disruption of the climate is worsening faster than ever, and threatening the poorest populations of the planet and conditions for civilized life on Earth.”
All the warning signs are here. Climate disruptions are multiplying, affecting the poorest populations of the global South, but also in the global North: (...) read more

Rio+20: Failed Diplomacy, Feeble Democracy ¤ Pierre Calame ¤ 18 July 2012The Rio de Janeiro experience has left us with a planet-sized headache. It brought together tens of thousands of people and almost a hundred heads of state to adopt a 50-page, take-it-or-leave-it declaration that repeats commitments made long ago and not kept, taking care to include all the buzz words of a liturgy now emptied of all meaning: the role of women and civil society, rights, the importance of democracy and popular participation, not to mention indigenous people, some of whom were (...) read more

Rio+20 and Beyond. No Future without Justice ¤ Civil Society Reflection Group on Global Development ¤ 22 January 2012Over the last 20 years, little has been done to change patterns of production and consumption that pollute, erode biodiversity and lead to climate change, while commitments to human rights and gender justice have not been fulfilled. We are facing societal and ecological disaster. The State can respond quickly to this, if based on democratic legitimacy and accountability. In times of growing global interrelationship between societies, economies and people, universally agreed principles are (...) read more

Proposals for a New World Governance ¤ FnWG Team ¤ 16 July 2011Working Paper for the International Workshop
Biocivilization for the
Sustainability of Life
and the Planet
in the run-up to the Rio+20 Conference
Rio de Janeiro, 9 to 12 August 2011
Which architecture of power is needed,
from the local to global level?
How should we organize? How can we organize in a fair and sustainable manner? How can we govern effectively? These deceptively simple questions have been troubling philosophers, jurists and theologians since the dawn of time. These (...) read more

Document Database

Post-2015: Global Action for an Inclusive and Sustainable Future ¤ European Report on Development (ERD) ¤ 5 June 2013Based on an assessment of the MDG experience and on an analysis of the changing international context and likely trends for the next 20-30 years, the ERD 2013 attempts to identify key potential drivers of a global partnership for development post-2015. Three such drivers are highlighted:
Money: Development Finance. A fundamental question for an ambitious post-2015 agenda is how to both raise additional development finance and make it more effective. The Report points to the importance of (...) read more

A Proposal for Governance in the Post 2011 World ¤ Heather Marsh ¤ 1 June 2013Optimism is a political act. In fact, these days, cynicism is obedience. - Alex Steffen
The world is long overdue for a completely new system of governance. The need for political representation or a paternalistic and opaque authority has been removed by technology. Governance by nation states is now as arbitrary and illogical as city states were earlier found to be. Corporations have the freedom to live in a world without borders or social responsibility, to own property no individual can (...) read more

Rio + ??? ¤ Cândido Grzybowski ¤ 3 July 2012Where have we got to at the end of the day? Where are we going? What vision do we have of the destiny we share so closely with nature? In what way can we create the conditions to ensure that all human beings, whoever they are, can live well and find happiness while caring for and sharing the generous planet that is our home? What changes do we need to make to the way we currently organize ourselves, produce and consume, a system that produces a shameful level of exclusion and social (...) read more

Proposal for a Charter of Universal Responsibilities ¤ 28 December 2011Preamble We, Representatives of the Member States of the United Nations, gathered in Rio de Janeiro for the Earth Summit, June 2012
Recognizing
1- that the scope and irreversibility of the interdependences that have been generated among human beings, among societies, and between humankind and the biosphere constitute a radically new situation in the history of humankind, changing it irrevocably into a community of destiny;
2- that indefinite pursuit of current lifestyles and (...) read more

Rebuilding the Environmental Balance

Raising International Climate Finance ¤ International Trade Union Confederation ¤ 19 December 2012The labor movement presented in Doha, in November 2012, a proposal on how to raise the agreed 100 billion dollars to fight against climate change from public contributions, and how to go even further through direct investments from pension funds toward sustainable choices.
Finance is a key tool to advance climate policy. As was shown again in Doha, it is one of the key elements in the essential negotiations to seek an agreement. The ITUC, TUAC, and Sustainlabour organized on Friday, (...) read more

Legal Principles of a New World Governance

The Emergence of Global Administrative Law ¤ Benedict Kingsbury,
Nico Krisch,
Richard B. Stewart ¤ 20 October 2010Emerging patterns of global governance are being shaped by a little-noticed but important and growing body of global administrative law. In this article we begin the task of identifying some patterns of commonality and connection sufficiently deep and farreaching as to constitute an embryonic field of global administrative law. We point to some factors encouraging the development of common approaches, and to mechanisms of learning, borrowing, and cross-referencing, that are contributing to (...) read more

The New Roles of States and Territorial Scales

What Europe does the world need? ¤ Pierre Calame ¤ 6 June 2010We often find ourselves asking the question: what Europe do we want? The time may have come to look at the question the other way round, and ask ourselves: what Europe does the world need?
Does the world even need Europe? It would be fair to say that today’s mood is one of disillusionment, and that the prospects for the European Union do not look very heartening. For its founding fathers, building the European Union was a major feat. They saw the Union as the means to move beyond the (...) read more

Trade, Money, and Finances

Alternative Finances ¤ Susan George ¤ January 2007Now is the time to rediscover John Maynard Keynes’s revolutionary ideas for the organization of international trade and adapt them to re-balance finances in the world’s economies of the twenty-first century.
The economist John Maynard Keynes came to the postwar table with an innovative project for the future of world trade, which he called the International Trade Organization (ITO), supported by an international central bank, the International Clearing Union (ICU). The ICU was meant to issue (...) read more

Bank of the South, International Context, and Alternatives ¤ Eric Toussaint ¤ 9 September 2006The Bank of the South proposes to try to break the dependence of developing countries on international financial markets, channel their own capacity for saving, stop capital flight, channel central resources to priorities for independent social and economic development, change investment priorities, etc. It is designed as a public bank and as an alternative to the Inter American Development Bank and the World Bank.
The Bank of the South can grant credits with or without interest, as well (...) read more

The Architecture of World Governance

Setting up an Arbitration Tribunal on Debt: An Alternative Solution? ¤ Hugo Ruiz Díaz ¤ June 2003This memo is a brief analysis of a few proposals for the institution of an international arbitration tribunal on debt. The idea is to institute an independent international arbitration body that recognizes the respective responsibilities of debtors and creditors. Facing the seriousness of the problem of external debt, this tribunal is intended as a more realistic proposal than the proposals advocating plain and simple cancellation.
The proposals aim at an in-depth solution through a (...) read more